Folsom Lake is Back!

Granite Bay

Nov. 19, 2017

Dan Rathbun
Event Director

It was a perfect day for an orienteering event at Granite Bay, Folsom Lake State Recreation Area. As it turns out, we had one of our largest turnouts that I can remember, so a big thanks to all for being patient during the registration and start process.

Some 198 people ventured out on five courses: White, Yellow, Orange, Brown and Red. A huge thank you to our volunteer Course Setter Bill MacDonald. Course setting is a very tedious, time-consuming, yet rewarding process involving weeks of planning, map making and control placement. He was first a participant, then Bill began volunteering with the GCO meet organization and then quickly joined the small group of volunteer course setters. We would love to train more people for all positions, so please consider helping at events. We appreciate all those that made this event possible:

Bill MacDonald: Event planner, course designer, control placement man and beggar of forgiveness from wife and family

Paul Keeton: Registration, finishes, setup, takedown and the everything guy, and getter of lost people

The White course had 48 participants on 19 teams. Greg Mandler cleared all the controls in just over 25 minutes; very speedy. Chris and Thomas Lillis had a fast run to take second, and Jeremy, Joel and Caleb Funk grabbed the third fastest time.

The Yellow course had one control-setting error. The CS placed 50 controls throughout the Granite Bay area, and only one control, the Yellow course #2 (#112) was misplaced (and misunderstood). Some of you spent five minutes looking for it (either finding the misplaced location or moving on), and others, like Jason Froehlich, spent over an hour looking. Usually we get word of a misplaced controls very quickly and it is usually immediately corrected by the CS. Unfortunately most had passed by this control before it was corrected. Only you know what this error set you back with regard to time. These results do not account for that lost time, and we hope you are able to quantify this yourself and adjust your time accordingly. We apologize. Since this is a beginner course, it's unreasonable to expect participants to know a control is misplaced, so it's understandable that many of you spent a lot of time looking. That being said, Gary Kraght covered the Yellow course in blazing speed to take the top spot with a 37:44 time, followed closely by two Carson High School NJROTC participants, Kyle Holloway for second and then Bryar Fancher for third fastest. Greg Mandler had a great time as a second course on Yellow with 42:00. The Yellow course had a stunning 88 participants (counting Greg) on 40 teams.

The Orange course saw 24 participants on 18 teams. The top spots were dominated by our JROTC participants. The fastest time went to Seth Lopez of Turlock High School JROTC at 1:01:47. The second fastest time went to Kyle Navarro of Carson High School NJROTC of 1:07:52. And in the third spot was Briana Sanchez of Carson High School NJROTC with a time of 1:14:08.

The Brown course had 21 participants on 19 teams. The top three spots go to members of the Carson High School NJROTC. The top four spots on the Brown course had less than 10 minutes difference between them. The top spot on the Carson team goes to Chris Berggren with a time just under one hour at 59:27. Second fastest time goes to Chris Paluch at 1:03:03. And the third fastest time goes to Jarrod Meyer at 1:07:27. Great job to all the JROTC groups!

The Red course had an exciting nail-biter finish. Mats Jansson of GCO arrived at the finish 13 seconds earlier than Anastasiya Gordeeva of BAOC. Both had very impressive times on the difficult Red course. Mats Jansson had the fastest time of 1:04:38. Anastasiya Gordeeva had the second fastest time with a 1:04:51. Not far behind those two, for the third fastest time, was Tapio Karras of BAOC with a time of 1:10:05. There were 18 participants on the Red course.

Again, thanks to everyone who came out to play and support the Sacramento region Orienteering Club, Gold Country Orienteers.

If you enjoyed your experience, check out our partner club in the Bay Area, the Bay Area Orienteering Club. If you want longer orienteering events check out NavX Challenge, NavX Challenge or for some very unique and fun orienteering, check out Terraloco.
Don't forget about our Folsom Event on Dec. 9. Check the site for more information. And again, please consider becoming a volunteer for GCO.